30 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
of the improvement of their cattle, and they were not nu¬ 
merous, preferred the cloddy buttocked Yorkshires! 
Yet, there is perhaps not one of the immediate descen¬ 
dants of this bull, that would not be readily selected out 
of a large herd of the best common cattle, for its superior 
beauty of form. 
The first cross between choice native cows and the 
improved Short Horn, has generally resulted equally fa¬ 
vorably : indeed, the very beauty of the produce, has 
tended to prevent further attempts at improvement, by 
encouraging farmers to breed directly from half and 
three-quarter bred bulls. They frequently lack little of 
of the beauty of their sires, and their services are to be 
more cheaply procured. But the characteristics of a 
variety thus obtained, are not sufficiently stamped upon 
them in the first, second, or even third or fourth cross, 
to be perpetuated with any great degree of certainty in 
their offspring. In the language of the Rev. Henry Ber¬ 
ry, “ to breed from the produce of a cross directly among 
themselves , will lead to the results which have induced 
many persons, without due consideration, to believe con¬ 
clusive against crossing ; but to take one cross, and then 
return and adhere to one breed, will in the course of a 
few generations, be found to stamp a variety with suf¬ 
ficient certainty.” 
Repeated experiments have amply demonstrated, that 
interbreeding between the Durham and our common 
race, if conducted on the principles advocated by Mr. 
Berry, viz : by a constant resort to the pure blooded bull, 
is attended with a decided and manifest improvement of 
the produce in every successive generation. The bull 
selected, should be small of his kind ; fine in the bone ; 
unusually full in the crops and bosom, and wide in the 
loin and haunch—points in which the common breed are 
defective. He should be chosen too, from a family of 
decidedly good milkers. If the bull is large of his kind, 
the produce are generally coarse, and marked with the 
defects which attend great disparity in the size of the 
sire and dam. The dam should be as good in the points 
indicated in the bull, as our means of selection admits 
of: short legged, compact, deep in the girth, and a plen¬ 
tiful and steady milker. We have already alluded to the 
change effected by the farmers of Ayrshire on a poorer 
breed, by a Short Horn cross ; and there can be no good 
reason why the American farmer, with the same skill 
and perseverance, may not be equally successful. In¬ 
deed there are grade Durhams already among us, which 
there can be no doubt equal or excel the Ayrshire in eve¬ 
ry desirable point. 
The Durham, as we have before remarked, requires 
more feed than our small native cattle. This, his supe¬ 
rior size, would lead us to expect. But though a great¬ 
er. he is a more promiscuous consumer, the coarsest 
quality of hay or straw being readily devoured by him. 
In England, straw, with a very small allowance of tur- 
neps, constitute his exclusive store keep in winter. But 
to bring this matter to its true test, will the Durham 
yield as great a return in flesh, fat, or milk, for the 
amount of food consumed, as any given breed? That 
he will,repeated experiment, as well as his daily advanc¬ 
ing popularity, in a country where there are many va¬ 
rieties greatly excelling our own in aptitude to fatten, 
and at least equaling them in milking properties, fully 
attest. The amount of food required by him, therefore, 
forms no objection to the improved Short Horn, oh good 
soils, either in his pure state, or as a cross with others. 
The only question now to be considered is, will the 
recommended cross, supply us with working cattle ? It 
is asserted on the best authority, that the pure blooded 
Durham ox, will “ work admirablyand the reason as¬ 
signed for his not being oftener used for that purpose in 
his native country, is, that his early maturity renders 
him too valuable at three, for the butcher, to be retain¬ 
ed with profit until four or five, for the yoke. There 
can be but little doubt, that united with our smaller, but 
vigorous and active race, a heavy and powerful variety 
of working cattle will be produced. Those especially 
fed on upland and less nutritious pastures, whose la¬ 
bor ought to compensate for their tardier maturity, with 
size, feeding properties, and docility, increased by the 
cross, will lose little, and probably nothing of the acti¬ 
vity and hardihood of the common race. To what pre¬ 
cise extent interbreeding should be carried, to produce 
the most valuable breed of working cattle, experience 
can alone determine. HENRY S. RANDALL. 
Cortlandville, January 21, 1840. 
Mr. Garbutt’s Premiums. 
Mr. Jesse Buel —I was highly gratified on seeing the 
generous patriotism of your much esteemed father, in 
giving premiums for the improvement and introduction 
of useful agriculture. Being desirous of knowing the 
nett profit per acre from our best cultivated farms, and 
the system pursued in their cultivation. I, through the 
medium of the May number of the Cultivator, in 1837, 
offered six premiums amounting to forty-four dollars, 
for the most profitable farm for three years’ cultivation; 
but did not designate whether the estimate should com¬ 
mence in the spring of 1837 or 1833 ; and as the season 
was some advanced before the proposition was made, 
there might be some difference of opinion as to the time 
of commencing the experiment. I therefore now state 
that if some commenced their estimate in 1837, and oth¬ 
ers in 1833, that they shall each have their premiums if 
deserving. 
It was my intention to have forwarded the money on 
the first of November to the Editor of the Cultivator, 
for him to distribute ; but the heavy dispensation which 
deprived you of a father, and our country of a highly 
' :■ ' ' 1 " .. ’ * — 
valued friend, prevented me from doing so. I now ap¬ 
point you, and my esteemed friend L. Tucker, judges on 
the successful competitors, if any there should be, and 
request that the necessary communications relative there¬ 
to be sent for publication in the Cultivator. 
As soon as you decide who are the successful individu¬ 
als, please notify me by letter, for weakness of my eyes 
has prevented me from perusing even the agricultural 
journals, and the money shall be forwarded immedi¬ 
ately. Yours respectfully, 
WILLIAM GARBUTT. 
Wheatland, Dec. 10, 1839. 
New Imported Boar Prince Regent. 
Messrs. Editors —Permit me, through the columns 
of your widely disseminatetLjournal, to give a descrip¬ 
tion of the recent importation of the young boar Prince 
Regent. He was farrowed in June last, in the town of 
Reading, Berkshire county, England, and was the choice 
from a large lot of pigs, and said by his shipper to be 
unrelated to any thing before sent out to America, and 
on this account will prove a valuable cross on the old 
stock of Berkshires that we at present possess. His 
characteristics are the same as the best heretofore im¬ 
ported, viz. color black, with the exception of a little 
flocking of white on the face and along the sides, and 
three white feet. His face is dished, the head fine, 
ears upright, and a trifle more pointed than those of 
Black Warrior. He has more length for his size and 
age than any boar I have bred from, and yet possesses 
the same good points in which long hogs are generally 
so deficient; a strong, slightly crowning back, and thick 
hams and shoulders. He suffered much from inatten¬ 
tion on his voyage over here, but is now in fine thriving 
order. I am assured that his parents are of a large 
size, and I have no doubt he will be quite big hog enough 
when grown, to gratify the most cormorant appetites. 
I shall have a few pigs of his get in June, and a sea¬ 
sonable supply thereafter, as the sows now coming in¬ 
to season are more generally stinted to his Royal High¬ 
ness. 
I regret that you have decided against advertisements. 
To myself they are half the spirit and interest of the 
paper, and my friends generally express the same sen¬ 
timents. I hope that you will eventually have encou¬ 
ragement enough to come out with a semi-annual ad¬ 
vertising sheet, and then no one can have cause to 
grumble, for those that dont like to bind it up with the 
rest of the paper, can let it alone ; but, tome, advertise¬ 
ments are of as permanent value as any other part of 
an agricultural work. 
My rule for filling pig orders is, those first remitting, 
take precedence. Address, post paid, 
A. B. ALLEN, 
Buffalo, Erie County, New-York. 
gey- We have received from Mr. Allen, a plan and 
description of an extensive piggerjq built by him last 
fall, which will be published in the next number of this 
paper. _ 
Chinese Tree Corn. 
Messrs. Gaylord and Tucker —Permit me to say a 
few words by way of recommending the Chinese Tree 
Corn. And for fear that some of your readers may 
come to the conclusion that I have been bribed to come 
out in its favor, I therefore will barely remark that I 
was humbugged in the article to the tune of $1.50, for 
six ears of this reputed early corn. That it does not 
possess the good qualities recommended, appears quite 
evident, and the fact of its being a late variety of corn 
must have been well known to the person who gave it 
such an admirable recommendation. Now, as the old 
woman said, it is an ill wind that blows no where, so 
we say that it is a poor variety of corn, that possesses 
no good qualities. I fear that in exposing this splendid 
humbug, writers have overlooked any good qualities 
this corn may possess. With me it has not proved an 
entire failure. I planted on the fifth of May, and a con¬ 
siderable quantity has ripened sufficiently for seed. 
From information derived from several gentlemen, who 
have grown it the past season in Ohio, I am inclined to 
believe it will prove a valuable variety for a more south¬ 
ern latitude. H. Case, Esq. deputy post-master at Buf¬ 
falo, informs me that he has grown about an acre of it 
on his farm, in Ohio, the past season, and that he con¬ 
siders it as an invaluable variety for that section of 
country. From these and other facts that have come 
under my own observation, I trust Ohio, Michigan, 
Indiana and Illinois, will derive advantage from the in¬ 
troduction of this corn among them. I therefore have 
determined that, in every bundle or box of trees or 
plants, that I shall send west next spring, to put up 
some of this corn, so that my customers, nolens volens, 
shall have it in their power to make a trial of the same. 
I have an early variety of the white flint corn, which 
very much resembles the Chinese, only that it is about 
one half the size ; I intend the next season to cross these 
two kinds together ; this I shall do by planting the Chi¬ 
nese early, and the other some weeks later, and I am 
not without hopes, from this product, to obtain a varie¬ 
ty of corn which will prove valuable in this climate. 
I had intended to have made some remarks on the 
subject of swine, but this I must defer for the present; 
however, I would just say to gentlemen passing through 
Buffalo, fail not to call and take a look into the piggery 
of A. B. Allen, Esq. and if they do not say that one half 
of the good qualities of these pigs, over the common breed, 
has not been told them, then I will acknowledge at once 
that they have been brought up among fine pigs. How- 
' : ' ■ — -- . — - 4 
ever, after all, for a long or a short race, I would bet two 
to one, on Landpike over Seneca Chief or Black War¬ 
rior. B. H. 
Buffalo Nursery, January, 1840. 
Education of Farmers. 
Messrs. Gaylord and Tucker —By your kindness I 
have already hazarded, before the public, through the 
Genesee Farmer, the assertions, that our republic must 
be, both in its character and destiny, what farmers 
make it, and what they say it shall be; that, as a means 
of this power, they already possess a greater amount of 
really useful knowledge, than any other class of the 
community; that their inducements and facilities for 
becoming men of sound and extensive knowledge, are 
greater than those of merchants, lawyers, physicians, 
clergymen or professors of colleges ; that the teachers 
of our country schools should be practical farmers, who, 
for a course of years, should make teaching a winter 
profession, the same schools to be under the charge of 
ladies during the summer; that nine tenths of the mem¬ 
bers of legislatures, and the occupants of other offices, 
should be practical farmers and mechanics; and that 
American farmers were called upon, by their duty to 
themselves, to their country, and to the world, to take 
their own education and legislation into their own 
hands. 
I will now present, with a word of explanation, one 
or two subjects, essential in the education of every man 
and woman, and of course of every farmer; for the 
double reason that they are essential, and at present al¬ 
most entirely neglected. 
No one can hesitate to acknowledge, that those sub 
jects and those modes of teaching are of the first im 
portance, which exercise most effectually and most har¬ 
moniously, the various powers and faculties conferred 
upon man by his Creator—that to call into action at the 
same time and on the same subject, the hand, eye, judg¬ 
ment, feelings, imagination, taste, and above all the 
heart, must be more effectual on any subject, than 
merely committing to memory words without meaning. 
Grounded on this self-evident truth, I will venture a 
motto, alike applicable in the education of every child, 
whether of a farmer or any other member of the hu¬ 
man family, viz: “NATURE BEFORE BOOKS, AND 
DRAWING BEFORE WRITING.” 
I present this motto with the greater confidence, as 
its common sense is corroborated, by the experience of 
the best schools at present in the world, and by many 
in ages long gone by. In the Prussian schools, previ¬ 
ously to any attention given to reading or letters, chil¬ 
dren are occupied for six months or a year, in the exami 
nation and study of things—objects of nature and art, 
learning their names, properties, uses and relations. 
And letters and reading when commenced and pursued, 
are used almost entirely as aids in extending the know¬ 
ledge of things—as instruments, not as sources, of know¬ 
ledge. In so doing, they observe in the work of stu¬ 
dents, no less than of mechanics, the good old fashion 
of “ learning tools by their use.'” The result is that 
about one week only is required for a child to learn to 
read plain sentences, and that not as an irksome task, 
but as a delightful exercise; so delightful, that by it, 
any child will literally learn himself to read, also to 
spell, write and speak correctly, the teacher or parent 
only answering his questions, or removing the obstacles 
he may find in his way. 
In view of these principles of common sense, corro¬ 
borated by the experience of the present as of former 
ages, the first step for giving to education, especially 
the education of farmers, its proper character and ele¬ 
vation, is to furnish the seventy thousand schools and 
the two millions of families in our Republic, with “ cabi¬ 
nets of nature and art,” or collections of minerals, 
plants, shells, prints, drawings, penmanship, needlework, 
mechanism, &c. &c. The second step, intimately connect¬ 
ed with the first, is the employment of children, by the 
use of the slate, pencil, paper, scissors, knife, &c. in 
drawing and otherwise representing the various speci¬ 
mens in their cabinets, and the objects of nature and 
art generally. 
These two steps in elementary practical education, 
are as easy as they are important; as little more is ne¬ 
cessary than permission for those to take them, who 
need their benefit. Every child, of his own accord, ob¬ 
serves and collects specimens of the works of his Crea¬ 
tor, scattered around him. If by any means he can ob¬ 
tain a slate and pencil, paper, or other appropriate in¬ 
struments, he will be sure to make attempts at imita¬ 
ting or sketching the figures, representations or objects 
coming under his observation. 
Whatever specimens or instruments are put into the 
hands of children to aid and encourage their efforts, 
ought to be, at the outset, few and simple, and of the 
most elementary character. Fifty well selected labelled 
specimens, are better than fifty hundred; and a slate 
and pencil with a graduated foot rule and a right angled 
triangle, both formed of wood one-sixth of an inch thick, 
are preferable for beginners, to an extensive case of 
mathematical or drawing instruments. A pair of divi¬ 
ders or compasses, fitted with a point, pencil and pen, 
are convenient, and even necessary for the full use of 
the rule and triangle. 
Linear and perspective drawing is important, as one 
of the first exercises and elements of practical educa¬ 
tion, not merely for calling into action the hand, eye, 
judgment, taste, &c. but for its extensive and frequent 
application by persons in almost every pursuit, and es¬ 
pecially by farmers and mechanics; also for its grea'.ly 
